Three Black Roses
by Kat-Knife
Summary: "You-you slimy Slytherin! I hate all of you bloody wankers! I wish that you would just go and off yourself!" I shout at him angrily. "Now, I'm sure that you don't mean that Minerva." An icy cool voice plunges into my pit of despair and self-pity and wrenches my thoughts back to reality. I watch with bated breath as Tom Riddle stalks closer to my bed...


The thudding of my heart beats against my ribs like a ticking bomb (those explosives that muggles are so fond of wielding), ready to explode at any given second. The pressure is mounting and I can feel the sweat dripping into my eyes. Everything seems muted around me; I'm surrounded by an impenetrable bubble, shielding me from the harsh chanting occurring just below me. The world seems to be devoid of all color, I can only see the sight just ahead of me, taunting me.

As I speed toward my destiny, it glints in a burst of golden light as the sun comes out from behind dreary, grey clouds, illuminating it in a halo of gold. My breath catches in my throat and there is nothing but me and it. I'm inches away from it, my fingertips already feeling the phantom touch of its fluttering gossamer wings. My face stretches in a proud smile as my fingers are about to close around the prize of the century.

SMASH

I feel a sudden weightlessness and pain blossoms in my upper right shoulder and my ribs. I gaze up in bewilderment as I watch the snitch fade away from me, still bathed in that wondrous golden light.

_"Perhaps the light's coming from Valhalla..."_ I think in a moment of muddied confusion.

Time is irrelevant as I fall away form the snitch. I watch in disinterested detachment as a fallen angel catches the snitch,_ my _snitch and triumphantly holds it above his head as it struggles feebly against his firm grip. His face twists in a mockery of a smile, still he looks more than beautiful, almost otherworldly in his fae like looks.

CRUNCH

I hear some fantastically loud sound, sickening in its wet, broken resonance.

_"I wonder what it is?" _My mind supplies almost instantly in response. Unfortunately, my body seems in no condition to care about what my mind deems important and my eyes mercifully close, but not before glimpsing large, haunting blue eyes that gaze at me in perplexity, calculating my worth in that single glance.

* * *

Pain assaults me in undulating waves. I oscillate between feeling blessed numbness and sharp lacerations that sting with a gleeful vengeance before fading away to be, yet again, replaced by the cool embrace of stupefied senselessness.

I swim along in that mire of muddled sensations, unable to challenge my faceless opponent and duel my way out of this strange land.

DRIP

I blink in a sudden movement of clarity as something icy and slimy in origin drips onto my upturned face.

DRIP

There it is again. I can feel it ON MY FA-

I wake up in a mess of tangled limbs and wild, strangled shrieks. Wild because I'm convinced that an acromantula is drooling on my face, waiting for me to awaken so that it can avenge its brethren; strangled because as soon as my throat utters its first shriek a cool, firm hand clamps down on my mouth, muffling any further attempt at noise.

My sticky, grimy eyes look upon the cool and collected sight of one immaculately groomed boy, Tom Riddle.

As I gaze upon his cool blue eyes, a smirk pasted on his usually polite face, I feel more like a pauper than ever. I can just imagine the sight that I must behold to any normal, sane person.

"Are you going to scream?" he asks me in a playful voice, raising a condescending eyebrow in question.

I glare back at him in response and quite childishly open my mouth against his palm and allow a small amount of saliva to escape my chapped lips and rest against his exposed skin.

He quickly retracts his hand and looks at me in disgust, like I'm not fit enough to lick his presumably polished shoes.

"That's disgusting," he states, an expression of utter contempt adorning his face.

I glare back at him, unable to fathom exactly why the golden boy is blessing my bedside with his "god-like" presence.

"What are you doing here?" I spit at him, unable to keep quiet any longer.

"Shouldn't you be asking me why _you're_ here?" he asks pointedly, a small smirk playing out on his face, "Do you even remember what happened at the Quidditch game?"

"I-" I stutter as I rack my brain for the memory in question. I come up blank, the memory sliding away form me as soon as I grasp onto its coattails.

"No?" Tom asks coyly, seeming to enjoy my confusion.

"No," I defiantly say, my chin rising a few inches and my eyes meeting his.

"No?" he repeats in a mockery of my voice, raising his eyebrows in false surprise, "Well, let me enlighten you. You see, when it seemed like Gryffindor was finally going to break its losing streak and win the Quidditch cup for the first time in fifteen years, the cunning and devious Abraxus Malfoy swept in and caught the snitch from under the nose of the Gryffindor seeker, Minerva McGonagall."

"What?" I breathe out in dismay as vague lights and colors solidify in my mind to form the complete picture of the memory.

"He cheated!" I yell out as soon as what had happened dawns on me, "He pushed me off my broom!"

"Now Minerva, listen-" Tom tries to cut in, looking decidedly more bemused by the sight of my reddening face.

"No, I won't listen to you! You-you slimy Slytherin! I hate all of you bloody wankers! I wish that you would just go and off yourself!" I shout at him angrily, my eyes filling up with unshed tears, and my hands balling up into fists beneath the sheets. I quickly look away from him, unwilling to let him see me cry and trying as hard as I can to blink back the flood of tears that are threatening to overwhelm me.

"Now, I'm sure that you don't mean that Minerva." An icy cool voice plunges into my pit of despair and self-pity and wrenches my thoughts back to reality.

I watch with bated breath as Tom Riddle stalks closer to my bed. I shrink away from him as he comes indecently close to me.

"We both know that you don't hate me, Minerva." he says lightly, his cool breath whispering across my face like a soft caress.

I squeak in distress, my voice seeming to have abandoned me in my time of need as Tom Riddle's cool lips alight on my cheek once, twice, before withdrawing.

"Goodbye Minerva," he says smirking widely at the sight of my bewildered face.

Without a backwards glance, he walks away, leaving behind a confused girl and three flowers that sit unnoticed on the bedside dresser; three black roses that the girl won't discover until morning. Black roses that signify something much more than what the girl thinks them to be; not love, not lust, but obsession, pure unadulterated obsession.


End file.
